Synopses & Reviews
The most comprehensive collection of letters by Rosa Luxemburg ever published in English, this book includes 190 letters written to leading figures in the European and international labor and socialist movements–Leo Jogiches, Karl Kautsky, Clara Zetkin and Karl Liebknecht–who were among her closest friends, lovers and colleagues. Many of these letters appear for the first time in English translation; all help to illuminate the inner life of this iconic revolutionary, who was at once an economic and social theorist, a political activist and a lyrical stylist. Her political concerns are revealed alongside her personal struggles within a socialist movement that was often hostile to independently minded women. This collection will provide readers with a newer and deeper appreciation of Luxemburg as a writer and historical figure.
Review
"One cannot read the writings of Rosa Luxemburg, even at this distance, without an acute yet mournful awareness of what Perry Anderson once termed ‘the history of possibility.’" Christopher Hitchens
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"Transports us directly into the private world of a woman who has never lost her inspirational power as an original thinker and courageous activist … [and] reveals that the woman behind the mythic figure was also a compassionate, teasing, witty human being." Atlantic
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"She emerges as one of the most emotionally intelligent socialists in modern history, a radical of luminous dimension whose intellect is informed by sensibility, and whose largeness of spirit places her in the company of the truly impressive." Sheila Rowbotham Guardian
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"[W]onderful ... The self-portrait in these pages is that of a professional revolutionary whose vocation is, if you'll pardon the expression, spiritual. Reading ... this book, I could not help falling in love with you, dear Rosa." Vivian Gornick Nation
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"Paced almost like a novel, the 28 years covered by this collection pass by almost too quickly." Scott McLemee Bookforum
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"The Letters of Rosa Luxemburg is a ... kind of memorial, a kind of sliver of one woman’s life bound together in one place ... Rosa Luxemburg comes alive in these pages ... if you love or admire or are just fascinated by [her], then you’ve no excuse not to buy this excellent book." Joel Schalit Jewish Daily Forward
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"This huge project is long overdue. Luxemburg’s correspondence reveals an extraordinary range and breadth of concerns and interests" PopMatters
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"Rosa goes on being our source of fresh water in thirsty times." Times Literary Supplement
Review
"Intrepid, incorruptible, passionate and gentle. Imagine as you read between the lines of what she wrote, the expression of her eyes. She loved workers and birds. She danced with a limp. Everything about her fascinates and rings true. One of the immortals." Eduardo Galeano
Synopsis
Letters from the heroic German revolutionary to her comrades, friends and lovers
About the Author
ROSA LUXEMBURG (1871-1919) was a Polish-born Jewish revolutionary and one of the greatest theoretical minds of the European socialist movement. She participated inthe founding of the German Communist Party and the Spartacist insurrection in Berlin in 1919.Annelies Laschitza has produced a number of works on the history of the labor movement in Germany, as well as serving as editor of the Collected Letters of Luxemburg and co-editor of Luxemburg’s Collected Writings in German. She is the author of the Rosa Luxemburg biography, Full of Life, Despite Everything, and The Liebknechts, Karl and Sophie: Politics and Family. She lives in Germany.PETER HUDIS is a Lecturer at Oakton Community College. He coedited The Letters of Rosa luxemburg; The Rosa Luxemburg Reader; and Raya Dunayevskaya's Selected Writings on the Dialectic in Hegel and Marx.